Hakuna Matata

This morning I woke up around 5:45am.  I was totally awake and energized, I felt great! I walked out onto my patio in my pajamas, and my glasses just instantly fogged up, it was comical how quickly they fogged!  I did a little exploring and took some pics before breakfast.

 This church is just to the side of the hotel, this is where they hold a lot of weddings for people getting married while they stay at the hotel.  It's really pretty!

 This is my "oh my gosh! I can't believe I'm experiencing this bliss right now!" face

 I seriously think it would be beneficial to my health to move here. I just need a doctor to prescribe this to convince Dan...

 They have these cool zen looking gardens and gazebos every where!

I showered and had breakfast.  They my boss Phil, his wife Linda, my new boss Teryl, and I headed off to go find the ward that started at 9:00am.  It was neat to drive around the island and see things in the daylight.  Guam is a lot bigger than I thought. Phil said that he thought it would take about 6 hours to drive the whole thing.  We found the church just in time to take the sacrament.  

 Yay we found it! After we pulled into the Jehovah Witness Kingdom Hall and thought it was the LDS church, haha

 The Barrigada Ward building

 It was raining when we got out of church, I love how this picture turned out!

This by far has been one of my favorite parts so far.  The four of us stuck out with our white skin and it was pretty easy to spot the missionaries in the ward too (they had 4 sets of missionaries, and 2 senior couples!) I was so humbled and so touched by the people.  There were people from every walk of life. I guess when they have General Conference, they have to it broadcasted in 6 languages for their ward! The first speaker in sacrament was a teenage boy.  He talked about how when he first received the Aaronic priesthood he was a little nervous, that he was sure what to do with it or how it worked. He shared how he didn’t want to come to church, but that his mom made him come anyway, and that having the priesthood has helped him understand the gospel and why he wanted to come to church.

The second speaker was his mom. She was a single mother and talked about the importance of having a Christ-centered home.  She talked about how we have been counseled to have Family Home evening, family prayer, and family scripture study, and that we to not just do it, but do it effectively. It really struck me that she didn’t say “consistently” or “efficiently” or “regularly”, but effectively.

The last speaker was the High Priest Group leader. He was from the Marshall Islands and shared a little of his conversion. He said that he was married and he was drunk Monday-Sunday every week. He had a drinking problem! One day his 9 year old nephew came up to him in the street with two missionaries and told the missionaries they needed to teach him. This man didn’t know English, and it sounded like that’s what the missionaries were teaching in. He taught himself English and can now read and write in it.  He and his wife moved to Guam so that his children could have a better education. I thought that was a pretty amazing story!

I loved that every person in that building was there because they wanted to be, there were no social pressures for them to be there and it was so so refreshing.  They bore the purest testimonies and I got so much out of church today. The women wore moo-moo’s that were colorful, and they all had big smiles, a lot of them with metal teeth.  I introduced myself in Relief Society and they all welcomed me to Guam and I felt like they accepted me into their ward family for those short couple of hours. One woman waved at me as I was leaving and I walked over and she took my hands and asked me my name.  She made my whole day. She made me feel so welcome and she was just glowing with the light of Christ. What a wonderful experience!!!

Afterwards, I came back to the hotel and got in my swimsuit. I went and laid on a beach chair next to the beach and read a book. I am such an idiot though. I didn’t put on sunscreen for the first 30 minutes and I am a LOBSTER! I didn’t think about the fact that we are a lot closer to the equator (I think) and that sun got me good. I was out on the beach for about 5 hours and relaxed and read another book from start to finish. It was paradise.

 I mean I was in and out of the shade, but I still got FRIED. But it was so nice...

 Don't mind this embarrassing pic, but I had to get the point across how much I was soaking this moment up.

 

 A view of the beach

For dinner, one of the guys from Guam that has been helping us plan the conference, invited about 16 of us over to his house for dinner. They had cooked an entire pig!!! Plus 6 other amazing dishes of chicken, fish, mussels, rice, and for dessert- fresh coconut pie. IT WAS AMAZING! All of the food was so so good. I felt like a missionary again for some reason. I think it was the situation of these humble people sacrificing so much to feed us that triggered that feeling.

YUM! :)

 Why do they cover the ears with foil? I dunno. But the mouth open without an apple in it has got be breaking some sort of rules.

 Here is some of the group, and the two chefs who made our dinner.

 In this picture, you can see the pies and desserts on the counter. They made us fresh coconut creme pie... OH MY GOODNESS! I have NEVER had such a good fruit pie. It was to die for!

It was a great day, despite my horrible sunburn.  I am just so grateful to be here and to have experiences such as these!